


Attention

by A_regrettable_choice_of_words



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Gender-Neutral Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Goes into space, Inspired by a Tumblr Prompt, Langst, Starts on Earth, ohwhataprettypinkhat had the idea
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-05
Updated: 2017-05-05
Packaged: 2018-10-28 05:30:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10824768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_regrettable_choice_of_words/pseuds/A_regrettable_choice_of_words
Summary: Inspired by a prompt by ohwhataprettypinkhat on tumblr.Lance found that he was often overlooked and ignored by the people around him. He tries to do what he can to make himself noticed but sometimes, it isn't enough.





	Attention

**Author's Note:**

> https://ohwhataprettypinkhat.tumblr.com/
> 
> This is where the idea came from ^^ This user is wonderful and all of their prompts are awesome, you should check them out!

“So what do you think Mama?” Lance had come home from a long day at school and was telling his mother, who was sitting across the room attempting to feed Lance’s smallest sibling, about the trouble he was having with his math teacher. He was hoping for some sort insightful advice or maybe just some reassuring words that it would get better or maybe even a call to the teacher.

But instead all he got was, “That’s nice, carino,” and a sigh as the infant, Sofia, spit out her mashed whatever yet again. She wasn’t listening. As usual. Now being from a big family- he had four sisters and two brothers- Lance could understand not being heard once in a while, but this was getting ridiculous. He had just talked for almost twenty minutes and his mother hadn’t heard a word of it? It wasn’t like this was the first time this happened. It was actually fairly common for him to speak for long periods of time only to realize that no one really listened to him.

It hadn’t always been like this. There was a time when he was the smallest of the McClain children- the fourth child. When he was little he tended to be the center of attention, as most little children are. After all, they need more care as they aren’t really capable of doing much for themselves. Lance could understand this. He could also understand his parents missing a few soccer games to split their time up between all of their children. After all, they couldn’t be everywhere at once. But this past year, after the twins turned four and Sofia was born he just seemed to take such a backseat to everything else. He was pretty sure that his parents had never missed one of Lucy or Maria’s recitals, and had missed very few of Zoe’s karate tournaments or Adrien’s or Dylan's’ various sporting events. It just seemed like he was the only one being left in the dust.

Lance had actually stopped playing soccer this year in favour of studying to get into the Galaxy Garrison- the best space travel school in the world. See, Lance had never really had something he was good at. He never excelled in sports (though he was average enough to play on the school team) or art or dance or had the best grades, but he did have a passion. He wanted to one day be able to free himself of the gravity of Earth and travel far away. He wanted to be among the stars. And the way to do this, as most knew, was to study at the Galaxy Garrison. It was an incredibly difficult school to get into but he believed that he could do it. The only thing was, with the lack of extracurricular activity, his parents and siblings had no reason to pay attention to him. He found that he could talk for long periods of time without being noticed or could enter or exit a room without being seen. One time, while everyone had been in the living room watching a movie, he told them he was going to stay over at Hunk’s and left. When he returned the next day, his elder sister, Lucy had asked him when he’d left as if she didn’t notice his absence.

It hurt. It always did when someone he felt close to didn’t feel the need to acknowledge his existence. But instead of wallowing in pointless self pity, he decided to make a game of it.

It started like this: when he and a few of his siblings were sitting on the couch, just talking he noticed not one really seemed to be reacting to what he was saying. So, in a way to check this he added something in the middle of his explanation. “Oh, and during math class the teacher’s wife came in and suked him off at his desk again. Don’t you always hate it when that happens?” He was rewarded with a few non-committal agreements and a nod of a head.

So he started doing this kind of thing often. At first it was entertaining. “Bye, Mama, I’m going to pierce my bellybutton!” he called as he left for Hunk’s one day.

“Okay, carino, have fun,” was called back at him.

“Mama, I’m going to buy some weed and have wild unprotected sex with a twenty-one year old!”

“Alright Lance, ” he hears shouted through the doorway from the kitchen at him as he starts to make his way to the library.

“See you in a few years Ma, I’m off to fight in the war against Mars!”

“Si, be back for dinner!” He was not back for dinner. He never got a text or a call about it either. His game was starting to get boring. He had gotten more and more ridiculous and not once was he ever called out on it. He had once spent twenty minutes telling Dylan about the wonders of acupuncture and hadn’t managed to catch his attention until he told the eldest that he had been practicing on Adrien’s hamster. And even so, the reaction was slow and confused. Once Lance said the hamster was fine Dylan went back to tuning the younger boy out and completely missed the tales of Lance meeting the real live Spiderman. He had gone on with that one for almost ten minutes before he succumbed to hunger and boredom, cutting himself off in the middle of the sentence. Dylan said nothing.

A few months later he got his acceptance letter from the Galaxy Garrison, along with Hunk getting his. He had been ecstatic and was amazed to learn that when he mentioned his acceptance, his family listened. (Well, most of them. He didn’t really expect the three youngest to really give a shit about the school he got into.) When he said something about buying a hoverbike on the way out the door that week, he had been happily shocked to realize that his mother had heard the words he said. (Even though she responded very negatively to that notion.) He had explained that he was joking and was going to Hunk’s before heading out the door.

Lance was already packed to go to his new school three weeks after his acceptance. The Galaxy Garrison was different from other schools, that if you got in they wouldn't actually tell you until a month and a half before the program started. He couldn’t remember the reason. But soon enough he had said goodbye to all of his family and headed off to the school of his dreams with his best friend.

 

=-=-=-=-=

 

While he was at the Garrison Hunk had been his rock. Everything about his life had changed- he’d gone from a huge family to living in a dorm with one other person. He’d found a rival- really Iverson had created that rivalry in Lance’s head. The professor would often compare Lance to Keith Kogane of the fighter pilot class during tests and simulations, pointing out things that Keith had done instead. When he did get things right he hoped that Iverson would bring it up to Keith as well.

He had been relatively happy in his new home- especially so when his self-pronounced rival had blown up at one of the teachers and gotten himself kicked out. This made room for Lance in the fighter pilot class. Hunk, his trusty engineer had been moved up with him and Lance couldn’t have been more proud of his best friend.

This was when they met Pidge Gunderson. The small pilot seemed to prefer to keep mostly to themselves, really only talking to Lance or Hunk when they were working with simulations. Lance thought that they should’ve bonded more to be a better team but Pidge didn’t appear to be at all interested. Lance hadn’t quite made his peace with this the night he and Hunk followed them up to the roof.

 

=-=-=-=-=

 

Keith didn’t even recognise him! He knew that he maybe wasn’t the most memorable person but he was loud and called Keith out every chance he got! Iverson had to have mentioned him once or twice right? He was top of the cargo pilot class when Keith was there (hence why he was the one to get the promotion when the raven got the boot,) and even now, he wasn’t the _absolute_ worst in the fighter pilot class.

His mind was getting off track. Saving Shiro was what was important now. Not what some stupid dropout thought of him.

 

=-=-=-=-=

 

 

The lion had chosen him! Out of all the people standing in front of it; it had chosen _Lance_ to be its pilot. He was amazed. Anyone else there could’ve done a better job (except maybe Hunk due to motion sickness) and it chose Lance.

He felt exhilaration rush through him as he flew over the desert and listened to the will of the Giant Cat whose mouth they were all currently residing. Everyone else seemed somewhat panicked when he breached Earth’s atmosphere, but something about the Lion was making him feel safe. Soothing not-quite-formed thoughts raced through his mind as he nearly unconsciously opened up the portal by Kerberos. He wanted to go through- not just to get away from the mystery ship chasing them down but because Blue (as he had affectionately named her) wanted him to.

 

=-=-=-=-=

 

Space was a funny thing. At first he and Hunk had stuck together like old times. Pidge had been absorbed in their gadgets and Keith, Shiro and Allura got along great. When Allura wasn’t with the two paladins she was with Coran, who spent most of his time fixing up the castle.

But slowly and surely, Hunk started drifting too. He found that he had more in common with Pidge than Lance and began talking and tinkering with them on his spare time. With only seven people and a few mice living on a giant ship you would think that if something happened with one of them you would notice.

Once again Lance found himself sitting on the couch next to someone who didn’t care to listen to what he had to say. He found this happening more and more, whether he was talking about mission strategy or just with small talk, no one seemed to care what he said or did. He once entered a room, ate some food goo, and talked for almost half an hour before being quiet for five minutes only to be asked when he had gotten there. He sighed. “A few minutes ago,” he answered with little tone in his voice. No one refuted this.

He’d gotten into the habit of throwing himself in front of shots meant to hit the other paladins and more often than not this resulted in him waking in an empty podbay and getting a lecture on coordination and training later from either Shiro or Allura.

He found himself getting more withdrawn from the other paladins and the two Alteans. He hardly ever spoke and when he did it was more often than not a random, stupid unbelievable thing just to see if he could say something jarring enough to get their attention. He never managed this.

It was time to change the rules of his old game.

On the next planet they landed on he offhandedly mentioned going to get something pierced as he wandered away from the group. No one argued against this. What was different was this time, he found a stall and some space money and did it. He got a bright purple ring shoved through his earlobe and thanked the small alien who did it. When he went back to the group he had expected - at least on some level- for them to notice. He had short hair and a neon thing hanging from his ear- how could they not notice? Even if they didn’t take him into account often they still spent plenty of time around him. And yet, nothing. No compliments (though if they did notice he doubted compliments would be what he would be getting), no lectures, not even a weird look or two.

It was an Earth month later when he pulled his next stunt. They were on some planet celebrating Voltron’s success at driving the Galra away from it when he noticed that the Aliens on this planet all had different coloured streaks in their human-like hair. So he sauntered up to one of said Aliens and asked them about it. Apparently- just like on Earth- streaks were used as an aesthetic thing here and his new temporary friend would be honoured to show him to the best place in this town to get them done. He was warned that unlike the dyes on Earth it wouldn’t fade out so easily and would grow along with his hair so if he wanted the streaks gone he would have to dye over them. Lance decided on electric blue. Maybe if it was brighter and more obvious they would notice. He smiled thinking of their reactions.

Turned out, they would not notice if it was more obvious.

 

=-=-=-=-=

 

Lance found himself rarely smiling anymore. With no one to notice it, what was the point? Really the only reason he was still here was he believed he was a good fighter and it would be a pain to find a new paladin for Voltron. Plus, he liked Blue. His bond with her had strengthened as his bond with everyone else had weakened.

He was glad for his bond with Blue because at this point it was the only thing keeping him afloat. Every once in a while- really whenever they celebrated on a new planet Lance would get some physical modification or another. At this point he had gotten an extra two ear piercings, black streaks in his hair to match the blue, and a tattoo that reached all the way from his hip, up his side, behind his shoulder, only stopping at his ear. For this he had decided to keep his colour theme up and get ocean waves in black and blue. He had also pierced his tongue (no one had noticed the odd way he talked for the following couple weeks) and was currently on his way to put a bar in his eyebrow.

At this point he had stopped seeing it as a game because he knew that they wouldn’t notice- but more of a habit he had picked up. Get a new body mod from every peaceful place you land. He winced as the needle pierced through his face and more so as the bar was put in. He smirked at himself in the mirror and paid the friendly-albeit slightly intimidating- Alien who had pierced him and thanked him before leaving the shop to rejoin his team.

Allura counted everyone present and hurried them back on the ship for the night after the party was over and it was time to move on.

 

=-=-=-=-=

 

Pidge was tinkering with adjustments they had made to the castle’s computers and scanners, trying to make sure they were reading everything right about the planet they were going to land on in a couple days. Hunk stood beside them, looking over the monitor and making sure the calculations in the ship's adjustments were correct.

“Have you noticed that Shiro hasn’t made us do many team bonding exercises lately? Or like, ever now?” Hunk wondered aloud to the shorter paladin.

“Now that you mention it… yeah. But I guess he figures that with us living together and all, there can’t be much more to learn right?”

Hunk nodded in agreement. Pidge continued their train of thought. “I mean like, Keith is probably the most closed off person here and we know everything about his past. And Coran loves to talk about his and Allura’s life on Altea. Shiro’s pretty self explanatory- plus he mentions things from time to time and Lance… well Lance is the loudest out of all of us here.” Pidge paused in thought. “When was the last time I saw Lance anyway? I don’t think he stuck around at the last party that we were forced into.”

“It’s just like him to disappear from things he wants to get out of,” Hunk continued with a chuckle. His smile dampened a little as he continued to speak. “Though I honestly can’t think of the last thing he said to me. That’s weird. Hm, I must have been really distracted,” he supplied for himself as Pidge nodded and continued working on the ship.

 

=-=-=-=-=

 

Pidge took their seat off to the left of the control room where they sat before going on missions. Lance was the last one to grace them with his presence and took a seat behind Keith where his chair was located. Pidge didn’t glance back.

“Guys, I’ve been doing some research on this planet so before we land the ship there I have to warn you that this planet has a really strong magnetic pull so you shouldn’t be carrying any metal on you. And yes Keith, that includes the dagger.” Pidge added the last part, knowing that Keith wouldn’t ask but would assume it was okay then get his foot chopped off or something. Pidge’s eyes roved over their team, smirking. “If anyone has any secret piercings they didn’t tell anyone about speak now or get your skin torn apart, we’re about to start descent,” Pidge continued with less than pure thoughts going through their head. They didn't think any of their boys would actually have any embarrassing secrets but it was better to ask and tease now than to have to deal with the repercussions of it.

“Wait.” A simple word from behind Keith. Pidge looked at the blue paladin in disbelief. Lance’s face was neutral as he slowly pulled out a plethora of metal studs, rings and bars from his skin, finally sticking out his tongue to remove a silver ball. When had he gotten all of those? Surely he hadn’t had them when he boarded the castle at first right?

Now that Pidge looked at him. Really looked- Lance was different. He no longer wore a smile. He seemed more toned and less gangly, his hair god, his hair, while still short, was partially dark and partially bright blue in streaks. Pidge’s eyes roamed over his face and body, noticing the change in stature and attitude. When had this happened?

They glanced around at the other paladins along with the Alteans and saw that their faces portrayed the same confused horror that the shortest of them felt. How had nobody noticed this? And was that a...tattoo by his ear under his armour? Focusing on the area Pidge confirmed that it was, in fact a tattoo that stretched into the paladin armour they all graced. Lance, face still completely neutral, told them that he was done and that they could continue to the planet now.


End file.
